


Aftermath

by roqueamadi



Category: Men in Black (Movies), Men in Black: The Series
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Misunderstandings, Post-episode: s03e13 J is for James
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-02
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:34:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27836890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roqueamadi/pseuds/roqueamadi
Summary: Post-episode 313 fix-it. After three years as partners, it seemed that one minor screw-up was enough for Kay to toss Jay aside like it was nothing. It felt like a betrayal. Until Jay finds out that wasn't exactly what happened.
Relationships: Agent Jay/Agent Kay (Men in Black)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 41





	Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

> Hello to any readers still in this little lovely fandom! This fic is a response to the MiB Animated Series episode 313 ‘J is for James’. For reference, [a description of this episode can be found here](https://meninblack.fandom.com/wiki/The_%22J%22_is_for_James_Syndrome) (though this description in my opinion gives too much credit to Kay - he’s definitely more of a dick than described here). The short version is: Jay takes Kay’s car for a joyride and crashes it, then gets fired from the MiB and neuralysed. Kay then brings him back in when it turns out he knew some info critical to the current case and he eventually gets his memory back. At the end Zed basically just shrugs and says he can rejoin the MiB again.
> 
> This episode bugs me. It's a betrayal of Kay's character to suggest that he would neuralyse Jay so easily at this point in their relationship. It's so out of character that when I watch it I'm sure this must be some kind of undercover or mole scenario and they're all faking. It especially bugs me that previously in episode 207, Eidi (a junior agent from a different intergalactic crime fighting agency) did basically the same thing (totalling Kay’s car) and barely got in trouble. Also, did they drop a plot line through the episode? The sequence at the start when Jay is in the car made it seem like the brakes had been cut, or the car deliberately sabotaged somehow. When Kay gets dropped by chopper into the car like friggin Jackie Chan (I’m honestly still recovering from that, like, 20 years later), he has to use an emergency braking system, implying that regular brakes were broken. And the crash only happened after Kay had taken over. So he knew the incident wasn’t completely Jay’s fault, yet he doesn’t even seem to fight for Jay’s side against Zed.
> 
> (Also, while ranting about this episode - why did the artists choose this moment for the guys’ suits, previously apparently indestructible to flame/water/laser blasts/whatever, to suddenly start tearing apart form minor impacts, revealing rippling superhero muscles underneath?? To clarify, this is not a complaint xD)
> 
> Anyway, I felt the need to fix it - not to change anything in it per se, but just to flesh out the things that I think were or should have been implied. It's not a rewrite, just a ‘what happened after the episode’ with some extra bits added to the chain of events. Hope you enjoy.

Jay went with a joke. It wasn't even funny, and neither Zed nor Kay qualified it with a laugh. Zed had agreed that Jay could return to the MiB, though he genuinely seemed to not care one way or the other. Worse, Kay had barely expressed an opinion on the subject.

The adrenaline from the casual conversation that had determined the course of the rest of Jay’s life was now filtering away and making him feel shaky. Zed was making his way out of the garage, already on his comm, and Kay followed without even glancing back. 

Jay’s forced smile faded as the two older men disappeared from the garage and he started to review everything that had happened in the past 48 hours. Relief turned to confusion and then to anger. He couldn't fathom Kay's apathy throughout this whole incident. He knew that what he felt for Kay wasn't reciprocated, and that was fine, but it was like a knife to his heart that Kay seemed to care so little whether Jay stayed or went.

He hurried through the base and finally caught up to Kay in the busy corridor near the labs.

“Kay, wait up,” he called.

Kay paused. Zed continued on without him, yelling into his comm. A large family of squat blue aliens elbowed past Jay before he could reach Kay. It was the peak of the cycle for flight arrivals.

“Can we talk?” he asked.

“We're talking,” Kay replied.

Jay clenched his jaw, glancing around. “You wanna do this here?”

“Do what.” It was barely a question. The lack of caring was enough to push Jay over the edge. 

He repressed a scoff and let the words loose, all the ones he’d been holding back. “I can't believe you, man. Three years we’ve been partners, working together every single day. Three years. I thought this was…” he gestured between the two of them, hesitated. “I thought we were _partners_ ,” he clarified. “Through good and bad, to the end, you know. You betrayed me.”

Kay took the rant with his usual steely demeanour, but that word made him clench his jaw tighter. Jay barrelled on.

“I didn't even get to defend myself, and you did nothing to defend me. The car was sabotaged, you know. Cut brakes. Did you even check that? You think I went on a high speed rampage through the city for fun? Which, by the way, is what plenty of other agents have done, or worse. Three years, and that was enough for you to drop me like trash. So, come on, give it to me straight. What did I do? Is it a personality thing, something I do that annoys you? I can take it man, just tell me.”

Jay finally paused to breath, and waited for a response—anything. Kay was silent and so still he could have been a cardboard cutout. And people were definitely staring.

Jay let out a puff of air. “You know what—whatever, man. Forget it.” 

Kay's comm took that opportune moment to ring. He turned away and continued down the hall to answer it. Jay stood there fuming.

A small sound behind him made him turn. Elle was leaning in the open door to her lab just behind him, watching him with a raised eyebrow.

“Heard that, did you,” Jay muttered, glancing around at the various onlookers who thought they were being so subtle.

“I hear a lot of things,” Elle said. “Enough to know that you shouldn't have said all that.”

“What do you mean?”

She turned and disappeared inside. Jay followed her in, closing the door behind him.

“Yo, Elle. What did you hear?”

Elle kept her back to him, picking up something on her desk. Jay wasn’t sure if she was going to ignore him completely, then she finally spoke. “A shouting match,” she said, shortly.

“Who shouting?”

“Kay and Zed. Before they called you in to terminate you.”

Jay took a moment to process that, and also just to try to imagine Kay shouting at Zed.

Elle turned to face him. “And then again, after Kay looked into your case further. Then he broke all MiB protocols to not only visit you after termination but to bring you back in.” She paused. “Kay's reaction when your memory didn't come back easily,” she added, quietly.

“What reaction?”

Elle squinted. “For someone who just made a big speech about how you’ve been Kay’s partner for three whole years, you’re very bad at reading him,” she said, irritated. “He doesn't show much, but anyone who knows him could see he was... _wrecked._ At losing you.”

“Wrecked,” Jay said blankly. “As in…?”

“As in not sleeping or eating for the three days it took to get you back. As in refusing to meet with Zed at all. As in a repair requisition was submitted for Kay's quarters for minor plasterwork.”

_Minor plasterwork?_ Elle just stared at him until he figured out what that meant, and once again simply couldn't imagine Kay demonstrating enough emotion to—what—punch a wall? Jay’s brain rejected the very idea.

“If this is all true, why didn’t he say anything?” Jay muttered. It wasn’t really a question, but Elle answered it anyway.

“Without going into a full psychoanalysis of Kay’s personality, in most cases—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know—that's just the way he is, I get it.”

Elle blinked. “I was going to say, in most cases it is derived from past trauma.”

Jay frowned. “It's _not_ just the way he is?”

Elle just lifted a shoulder.

Jay sighed. “Guess I'd better go apologise.”

He struggled to track Kay down for the rest of the day, and ended up waiting til he could catch him back in his quarters. His room was right opposite, and he heard the footsteps down the hall and the door thump closed. After that he waited another thirty minutes, partly to let Kay get sorted after the work day, and partly to build up his nerve. Then he went to knock.

When Kay answered the door, he was without shoes, jacket or tie, with his shirtsleeves rolled up over his forearms—shockingly casual, by Kay’s standards.

Jay held up a six-pack of beer like a peace offering.

“Erm. Can I come in?”

Kay didn't speak, but turned and walked back inside his apartment, leaving the door open. Jay followed nervously, closing the door behind him and placing the beer on the small kitchenette counter. He actually hadn't been in here more than a couple of times. He turned, and his gaze fixed onto the obviously fresh patch of paint on the wall opposite. Shoulder-height and fist-sized.

“Listen, uh...” Jay started, dragging his gaze away. Kay had sat down at the small table, returning to a bottle of whiskey that he had clearly been working his way through. Jay hadn’t known he drank whisky at all. He stumbled on. “I just wanted to apologise for earlier. I was out of line. I shouldn't have said any of that to you—”

“It's true though,” Kay interrupted.

“Huh?”

Kay took a swig from his glass. “Everything you said was true,” he said with a shrug. “You were within your rights to say all of it.”

Jay just stared at him.

Uncharacteristically, Kay filled the silence and kept talking. “Should have fought Zed harder,” he said, matter-of factly. “You were right. I betrayed you—betrayed your trust.”

This had Jay moving forward before he knew what he was doing, sliding into the other chair next to Kay.

“No, man, I deserved it. I was an idiot. It was stupid to take the car in the first place, I never should have—”

“I was the idiot. You deserve a better partner.”

Jay's hand closed over Kay's on the table—he was unable to stop it. “Don’t say that.” 

Kay didn't pull his hand away. Jay's heart was racing. “Look, everything’s turned out fine, anyway. Back to normal. We’re all good. I just need to get better at reading you, is all.”

He’d said it half as a joke, but something intense filled Kay’s eyes and Jay’s breath caught in his throat.

“You already read me pretty well, slick.”

It sounded like encouragement. Jay hoped he wouldn’t regret what he did next. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to Kay's. 

It was the biggest risk he'd taken in probably his whole life, because if this backfired, he didn't think he would ever recover. But long seconds passed and Kay didn't back off or push him away. Also, he didn't really reciprocate. Jay broke it off with a sinking feeling, leaning back to get a look at Kay's expression. He was shocked to find sight pink patches on the man's cheeks, which he'd never seen before.

Before Jay could speak, Kay said, his voice hoarse, “Sorry. I'm not very... It's been a long time since I…”

“We don't have to,” Jay said immediately, backing off. “If you don’t want, we—”

“It’s not that.”

Jay paused, halfway to completely mortified, unsure what was happening.

Kay was struggling to compose himself, struggling to put words together. “I, erm…” his voice was more unsteady than Jay had ever heard it. “I had some… experiences and… it’s hard to…”

Jay shook his head. “You don’t have to tell me.”

Kay took a deep breath and regained a little of his usual composure. “I will. But… it’ll take me some time.”

“That’s fine.”

“Maybe a lot of time.”

“Kay, I—”

Jay was cut off by both their comms buzzing simultaneously, and a second later, an alarm starting up throughout headquarters.

Kay reached his comm first. “Code blue.”

They got to their feet. It was a matter of moments for Kay to don his tie, shoes and jacket, his usual steely demeanor coming with them. Jay followed him to the door, expecting to charge straight out, but Kay paused there before opening it.

“About… today. Can we…?”

Jay didn’t need him to finish the sentence. “Hey, as far as I’m concerned, nothing happened. Boring few days, to be honest. Need this code blue to stop me literally dying from boredom.”

Kay nodded, a rare, small smile on his face. “Let’s go.”

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote something for this fandom a couple of months ago and assumed no one would ever read it as this series is so ancient now, but I actually got so many lovely comments, it really inspired me to write more! So, I hope you all like this one too. I have some vague thoughts about a third one kind of following on from this... It obviously leaves some things that need resolving! I'll see if I think of anything as I rewatch season 4 :)


End file.
